Lifestyle
How to clear out clutter in your workspace
NEW YORK (AP) — It starts with a Post-it note scrawled with a reminder. Then a chocolate bar you’ll probably eat later. An extra charging cord or two find their way into the mix, along with a laptop, a folder full of projects, a lanyard from a recent conference and a permission slip sent home from school.
And soon, the pile of things on your desk that are set aside for later becomes a giant, overwhelming stack.
The chaos of modern life and the ease of accumulating cheap items through online shopping have contributed to an abundance of clutter. That’s true in home offices and traditional workspaces alike. And those jumbles of misplaced belongings can drain our mental resources, distracting us from work and dragging down our productivity.
“Clutter reduces our bandwidth. It negatively affects our perception of our environment or ourselves,” said Marietta Van Den Berg, psychiatrist and medical director for Surrey Memorial Hospital in British Columbia. “It influences whether we make good choices or not. And it even influences our levels of stress and our levels of sleep.”
Researchers at UCLA found that women who were living with a high density of household objects had high levels of the stress hormone cortisol.
As households and workplaces embark on spring cleaning, it’s possible to reduce clutter and find more mental peace.
This article is part of AP’s Be Well coverage, focusing on wellness, fitness, diet and mental health. Read more Be Well.
“Things circulate into our lives all too easily. We need a competitive plan for things to circulate out,” said Matt Baier, owner of Matt Baier Organizing in Stamford, Connecticut. “A good example of that is buying on Amazon. It’s so easy. Boxes come in. We have so many houses that are just piled with boxes, opened and unopened, things that need to be returned, boxes that need throwing out.”
A pile of postponed decisions
There are many reasons we accumulate clutter. Sometimes we don’t know where to put whatever’s landed in our hands. Other times a paper represents a task — whether it’s paying a bill or making a phone call — that we can’t tackle right away.
“Clutter is actually just a postponed decision or action,” Van Den Berg said. “It’s things we pick up and put down. So we’re not making a decision about that piece of paper on your desk, or that book.”
Taking a minute to put an item away in its proper place can save time in the long run. The paper that requires a phone call can go into a bin labeled “Action Items.”
“If everything’s chaotic and you can’t find anything, you’re not bringing your best self to work,” said Renee Brown, owner of Renee Brown Organizing, based in Minneapolis.
Making time for decluttering
A messy workspace can be intimidating. But you don’t have to tackle it all in one day, Brown said. Committing to small decluttering sessions over the course of a week or months can make a difference.
“ Look at your schedule. Can you find 15 minutes or 30 minutes and block it?” Brown asked. If you have more time, spend an hour. Set a timer and see how much you can get done, she advised.
Some workplaces are setting aside time for employees to declutter their files and email inboxes weekly or quarterly, said Jenny Albertini, owner of Decluttered by Jenny, who works with individual and corporate clients.
“It’s OK to spend an hour a week or however much you need to declutter your inboxes, organize your files,” Albertini said. “Having that time scheduled in is what makes people feel accountable.”
Employees can gather on Zoom to support each other while decluttering, she said.
Start by sorting
Many professional organizers suggest sorting objects of the same category together. That way, you can see how much of each group you have and let go of any extras. After gathering office supplies, you may find you have more staplers or charging cords than you’ll ever need.
And with the full picture, Albertini said, “we can suddenly say, ‘Oh, I didn’t realize I kept buying extra pens, because some were in this drawer, and some were over in this cup, and some were in that shopping bag on the floor.’”
Baier, who demonstrates decluttering strategies on YouTube, recommends sorting on a clean surface such as a folding table. Set up bins for trash, recycling and papers to shred. Bankers boxes are convenient for sorting, and you can label them with sticky notes for categories such as electronics, office supplies and keepsakes, he said.
Label one box “elsewhere” for items that belong in a different room; but distribute them later so you don’t get distracted, Baier said.
Once you’ve sorted items into categories, then go through each box to eliminate what you don’t need.
Tackling piles of papers
When facing a mass of paperwork, consider whether you’re legally required to keep certain files, and then ask, “when was the last time you used this document?” Albertini said.
“Do you have anything coming up that you know you need it for? Is this hard copy the only one? Would you be able to do your work or task if you didn’t have this anymore?” she said.
Baier recommends dividing papers into four groups: running files, which you need to act on; sitting files, which you need to access regularly; sleeping files, which you need to keep just in case but can store remotely; and dead files, which you no longer need.
“Identify why you keep the files, because when you’re clear on why you keep something, it takes you to where it should go,” Baier said.
With a paper decluttering system in place, you can repeat it annually and it should only take about 20 minutes, he said.
Digital decluttering
When organizing digital files, take the same approach as paper: Sort into categories, then reduce. Work in short bursts of time to prevent decision fatigue, Albertini said.
“We’re really looking to deduplicate items or reduce the number that you have that really aren’t that special,” Albertini said.
With presentations, delete drafts and keep the final product. If you have photos of an event, choose the best two or three and delete the rest. With email, ask yourself, “Will I need this email again to get my job done? Will it provide knowledge or motivation for future work?” If the answer is no, delete it, Albertini said.
In some email programs, you can automatically send mail from a specific client or team into a folder. If you have thousands of unread emails, you can move those to a digital archive at the end of the year, Brown said.
Think before you buy
One obvious way to reduce office clutter is to buy fewer things. It can be tempting to buy drawer dividers or trays to organize pens and scissors. But another route is to reuse cardboard iPhone or greeting card boxes.
“You don’t have to go out and get expensive items,” Brown said. “Let’s find what you already have in the house and use it instead.”
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Share your stories and questions about workplace wellness at [email protected]. Follow AP’s Be Well coverage, focusing on wellness, fitness, diet and mental health at https://apnews.com/hub/be-well.
LONDON (AP) — “Doctor Who” and Eurovision unite for an evening of music and intergalactic adventure on Saturday — all thanks to Russell T Davies.
Before fans tune in for the annual song contest, they can enjoy Ncuti Gatwa’s Doctor and Varada Sethu’s Belinda Chandra attending the Interstellar Song Contest in an episode of the sci-fi series.
In real life, the Eurovision Song Contest is an annual musical competition and TV event that sees 37 countries compete for a crystal microphone trophy over a four-hour live broadcast. In the interstellar version, aliens from 40 different worlds vie to win, also by singing.
Davies says it took three years to pull it off the doubleheader because they had to work with the BBC to set the schedule and storylines in stone to ensure a perfect alignment.
Britain’s Sam Ryder took a “Space Man” to Eurovision before, in 2022. Now, Gatwa will read out the U.K.’s jury scores during the song contest’s grand final, held this year in Basel, Switzerland.
Talking to The Associated Press, Davies says that both Eurovision and “Doctor Who” share the DNA of old-fashioned Saturday night television, making the combination “irresistible.”
This conversation has been edited for clarity and brevity.
AP: Do you feel that Eurovision and “Doctor Who” naturally share a kind of fandom?
DAVIES: I almost think every episode of “Doctor Who” is a great big celebration, sort of noise and color and spectacle, and that sums up Eurovision as well. In pitching this to Disney+ as well it’s like, “Look we’re going out in 60 of your territories” and Eurovision itself has a viewing figure that some years is bigger than the Super Bowl. There’s not many shows that can say that on planet Earth.
AP: How much fun did you have with the lore of Eurovision?
DAVIES: It’s enormous fun. It could be said if you’ve never seen a single Eurovision Song Contest in your life, you can still come along and watch this. It’s the kind of thing we’d have made up for a “Doctor Who” story anyway.
One day I’ll do that “ABBA Voyage” story where the holograms come to life and start killing people. That’s the best idea ever. We’ve got to do that one then. Can you imagine? That would be just amazing. I think there might be some copyright problems with that but we’d overcome them.
The actual pitch for the story to Juno (Dawson), who wrote it, was Eurovision meets “Die Hard.” So as you will see, the moment it starts, there’s trouble, someone’s out to sabotage it. There are villains behind the scenes trying to disrupt the program. All chaos is let loose and the rest of the episode is spent saving people’s lives after that.
AP: How about the songs?
DAVIES: I think there’s four songs in total (by Murray Gold). Obviously we don’t get to all 40 planets with their songs, but it was a very big production. We had to hive this off into its own production unit. There are scenes in the television gallery, where 40 different monitors have output of 40 different screens. And that’s all been fed in live. That’s not done with green screen afterwards, that’s all stuff they’d already shot. Crowds, acts, rehearsals, backstage, presenters, all of that stuff, playing onto that set, so it’s terribly complicated.
“Doctor Who” showrunner Russell T. Davies explains why an intergalactic spin on the Eurovision Song Contest was an irresistible storyline for Season 2’s May 17 episode. (May 13)
AP: Is this the most expensive episode of “Doctor Who”?
DAVIES: Frankly, they’re all expensive. It was a lot, yes. It had to be planned very far in advance, more than any. Once you plan something carefully, then it costs less just because you’re not busking. We allocate each story more or less the same amount of money. So I think it ends up costing as much as the others, but it just looks so good because they had so much time to plan it.
AP: Am I allowed to ask how much an episode normally costs?
DAVIES: We never say that. I don’t know why, but we just don’t ever do it. I don’t think they’d tell me. I’d faint.
This image released by Disney shows Christina Rotondo from “Doctor Who” Season 2. (BBC Studios/Disney/Bad Wolf via AP)
AP: Are you planning to watch Eurovision this year?
DAVIES: Yes, I will be. This will be a great night. I always sit and watch “Doctor Who” — I’m old-fashioned — on its old-fashioned BBC One transmission at 7 o’clock at night.
I know people who have Eurovision parties, which I’ve never gone to actually. Look at my life, it’s devoted to television. I can’t bear other people talking over it. That would just be a nightmare. So I will be sitting in. I’ll get some nice dinner. I’ll be a very happy man.
AP: Have you got any favorites for this year?
DAVIES: I would like to go on a date with the man from Cyprus (Theo Evan). He’s beautiful. I do like the U.K. entry this year (“What the Hell Just Happened?” by Remember Monday). I have a theory it’s being underestimated in Great Britain. Just because we’re so used to losing. We’ve won five times, everyone. But this country gets a bit cynical about Eurovision sometimes. But I love our song. I think it’s got a very memorable chorus.
U.S. retail egg prices fell in April from the record-high prices they hit earlier this year, according to government data released Tuesday.
The average price for a dozen Grade A eggs declined to $5.12 last month after reaching a record $6.23 in March, according to the Consumer Price Index. It was the first month-to-month drop in egg prices since October 2024.
Overall, the average price of eggs of all sizes fell 12.7%, the steepest monthly decline since March 1984.
While wholesale egg prices have been coming down for a while, it was unclear how much store prices would decrease in April because consumer demand is usually high around Easter and Passover.
Still, retail egg prices remain near historic highs as a persistent outbreak of bird flu wipes out flocks of egg-laying hens. The April average price for a dozen large eggs was 79% higher than the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported for the same month a year ago, when the price averaged $2.86 per dozen.
Bird flu has killed more than 169 million birds since early 2022. Any time a bird gets sick, the entire flock is killed to help keep bird flu from spreading. Once a flock is slaughtered, it can take as long as a year to clean a farm and raise new birds to egg-laying age.
That can have an effect on the egg supply because massive egg farms may have millions of birds. Outbreaks on two farms in Ohio and South Dakota last month affected more than 927,000 egg-laying hens.
Lowering egg prices has been a particular focus of President Donald Trump. In February, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said it would invest $1 billion to help farmers improve their biosecurity measures to fight bird flu.
The U.S. has also increased imports of eggs from South Korea, Turkey, Brazil and other countries. According to Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute Sector Manager Kevin Bergquist, the volume of egg and egg product imports increased 77.5% during the first three months of the year compared to the same period a year ago.
The antitrust division of the U.S. Department of Justice is also investigating Cal-Maine Foods, the largest U.S. egg producer, which supplies around 20% of America’s eggs. Cal-Maine confirmed the investigation in early April..
Ridgeland, Mississippi-based Cal-Maine said its net income more than tripled to $508.5 million in its most recent quarter, which ended March 1.
For many, the return of the spring garden brings with it a sneezy, itchy, foggy-headed feeling that hits the moment a warm breeze stirs up invisible trouble. I’m fortunate not to suffer much, but my blue car turned a chartreuse shade of yellow last week, and a $32 car wash provided results that lasted only two hours. Sigh.
These seasonal allergies often go by the old-fashioned name hay fever, but it’s not the hay that causes misery for so many, it’s the pollen.
And not just any pollen, but the nearly weightless kind that floats up our noses and engages our immune systems. Trees, weeds, grasses and even some of our favorite flowers are culprits.
But pollen isn’t all bad. It’s essential to the reproduction of plants, the survival of insects and the entire food web. We humans could not survive without it, so we absolutely shouldn’t avoid high-pollen plants as a general rule. However, if you’re an allergy sufferer who has had to forgo planting a garden due to health reasons, plants that release the least pollen may enable you to smell the flowers.
Plants that might bring sneezes
Allergy-inducing plants are those that rely on wind rather than bees or butterflies to spread their pollen. Ragweed, which strikes in late summer and early fall, gets the most notoriety, but its springtime counterparts can be at least as irritating.
Trees most likely to cause symptoms include birch (Betula), catawba (Catalba), cypress (Cupressus), elm (Ulmus), hickory/pecan (Carya), oak (Quercus), sycamore (Platanus) and walnut (Juglans), according to the Ogren Plant Allergy Scale (OPALS), created by horticulturist Thomas Ogren and published in his 2020 book, “The Allergy-Fighting Garden.”
This article is part of AP’s Be Well coverage, focusing on wellness, fitness, diet and mental health. Read more Be Well.
Palm trees, too — but only the males. In fact, female trees don’t produce pollen at all, so seek them out when possible.
Grasses can irritate eyes and sinuses, too. The scale ranks Bermuda (except sterile male varieties), Johnson, Kentucky, orchard, sweet vernal and timothy grasses among the highest for allergens.
Weeds like ragweed, curly dock, lamb’s quarters, pigweed, plantain, sheep sorrel and sagebrush are also big pollen producers, Ogren found.
Not all plants are irritating to allergy sufferers
On the other hand, plants with “double” flowers or heavier pollen that doesn’t travel far are less likely to release much pollen.
Among trees, apricot (Prunus armeniaca), fig (Ficus), fir (Abies), fruiting pear (Pyrus), fruiting plum (Prunus domestica, Prunus insititia), redbud (Cerus), serviceberry (Amelanchier laevis), female ash (Fraxinus), female box elder (Acer negundo), female cottonwood/poplar (Populus), female maple (Acer), female palm (Arecaceae) and female willow (Salix) are easier on the respiratory system.
St. Augustine and sterile male Bermuda are safer bets in the grass department.
As for flowers, you’ve got options: Begonia, female clematis, columbine, crocus, daffodil, delphinium, hibiscus, impatiens, iris, bird of paradise, pansy, petunia, phlox, poppy, snapdragon, tulip, verbena and zinnia are friends. Roses, too — especially tightly packed, dense-petaled varieties, which exude even less pollen than those with single or semi-double flowers (rose allergies are more often fragrance-related than due to pollen, according to Ogren).
And if you suffer from seasonal allergies, keeping windows closed and getting someone else to mow the lawn will also help to nip your symptoms in the bud.
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Jessica Damiano writes weekly gardening columns for the AP and publishes the award-winning Weekly Dirt Newsletter. You can sign up here for weekly gardening tips and advice.
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For more AP gardening stories, go to https://apnews.com/hub/gardening.
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